PCI serial ports

[Guest]

I have this windows XP machine that is running a mercury analyzer. This
analyzer has 2 pieces the instrument itself and an autosampler. The
instrument is connected to the COM port and the autosampler is connected via
USB.

For whatever reason the autosampler is no longer being detected by the
computer I get messages that there's a malfunctioning device on the USB. I
suspect the port on the autosampler just went bad. I'm now trying to connect
the device via a 9 pin serial cable. There's additional ports on the
computer via a PCI card. This autosampler doesn't want to work and the
manufacturer is telling me that it's got to be connected to a COM port. They
suggested that I rename the COM port to #3.

Is there a way to turn these serial ports into a COM port so I can rename it
the way the manufacturer suggests? It's not obvious to me how to do this. I
hope it's possible.

 

[Noozer]

I have this windows XP machine that is running a mercury analyzer. This
analyzer has 2 pieces the instrument itself and an autosampler. The
instrument is connected to the COM port and the autosampler is connected
via
USB.

For whatever reason the autosampler is no longer being detected by the
computer I get messages that there's a malfunctioning device on the USB.
I
suspect the port on the autosampler just went bad. I'm now trying to
connect
the device via a 9 pin serial cable. There's additional ports on the
computer via a PCI card. This autosampler doesn't want to work and the
manufacturer is telling me that it's got to be connected to a COM port.
They
suggested that I rename the COM port to #3.

Is there a way to turn these serial ports into a COM port so I can rename
it
the way the manufacturer suggests? It's not obvious to me how to do this.
I
hope it's possible.

Uhm... Serial ports ARE COM ports. Device manager should have a COM port
listed for each serial port in your computer.

 

[Dave B.]

Sounds as though their tech support is lacking quite a bit in the PC
knowledge department, serial ports ARE com ports, nothing to convert. What
exactly do you have for serial ports in the machine? If you have only 2, you
would want them to be com1 and 2, generally with only 2 ports you don't want
to use 1 and 3. This is a fallback to the old DOS days, when com ports 1 and
3, and 2 and 4 shared interrupts, usually not an issue now but those that
have been in the industry for that long tend to stick to the old habits with
certain things.

 

[Guest]

The only COM ports listed are COM1 and LPT1 where COM1 is the onboard COM
port. The port in question is listed as "Other devices" and it identifies it
as a serial port. It doesn't have the "Port Settings" tab like the COM port
does, therefore I have no way to rename it.

 

[Dave B.]

LPT1 is not a com port, it's a parallel (or printer) port. If this "other
devices" port is supposed to be a com (serial) port on a PCI card, it sounds
like you need to install drivers for it.

--

 

[Guest]

Only the 1 serial port is listed. It's listed under "Other devices". It's
not considering it a COM port it's currently listed with the yellow question
mark. The problem is there's not a "Port settings" tab available to me so
changing it to be COM2 isn't an option. How can I make it an option?

 

[Dave B.]

That usually means you need to provide a driver for XP to make use of the
hardware, the pci card should have come with a driver disk, or it can be
downloaded from the mfg's website.

--

 

[Guest]

the manufacturer of the autosampler sent me some drivers. I installed them,
but it didn't change anything. The next thing I might have to do is open the
case and see who the manufacturer of the PCI card is and find drivers for it.

 

[David B.]

The drivers they sent were probably not for the PCI card, unless they
supplied the card to you. Your suggestion would be the recommended action.